| Climbing
Koyo Zom
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Thursday
15th August Set
off for Koyo Zom with 4 days food & gear. Left about 10.30. Easy
going over well frozen snow. Snow slope above not as bad as R & B
had said - didn’t sink in at all. At half height went off right using
crampons to top of rognon. Had lunch on upper glacier plateau - even ate
my fish today. 18,700 [5
700 m]
. H took ad. shots of me eating fruit & fish.
Koyo Zom quite impressive. Austrian ridge looks hard. Had long levelish
unpleasant trog to foot of ridge, kept breaking through wind crust.
Bivied at 19,000 feet
[5
800 m ]. Looked at S. Ridge, looks easy except top 1/3
steep granite. Might go but decided to stick to Austrian route. It
doesn’t look too far from here but in fact it is 3,500 feet [1
070 m ]
still to
go. Hoping for good weather. Friday
16th August Had
bad night. No sleepers. Harry reckons he slept one hour, I think I slept
a little more. The morning was also moderately miserable with wind and
spindrift. So a cold night and morning but perfect blue sky. Not a cloud
to be seen. Both felt psychologically bad though. Decided we couldn’t
face a bivi on the mountain and so decided to try to do it in a day.
Warmed up frozen tin of beans & sausage, pint of coffee between us
and we set off with day sacks. Left at 8 o’clock. Feeling rough at
first, then improved. Reached ridge (1000’) by 10.00. Then a good bivi
site by 11.30. Found some old Austrian pitons and roped up for a few
pitches over mixed ground and poor snow on ice - not hard though. H said
we had 2000’ [600 m ]
to go by altimeter. I thought we had it in the bag and
were half way. Dumped most of gear, duvets etc. Took one ice screw, pegs
and rope, axes etc. Continued towards snow field to by pass rocky
section, but soon got bogged down in deep snow - not steep, unroped.
Decided to head back towards rocks where the going was better. Nearly to
ridge line. All went well to just below rocks the snow cover diminished
and soon I was on water ice. Threw rope down to H who dug himself a step -
only to find water ice a foot below the surface, then belayed on our
only ice screw. I carried on to the end of the rope, but couldn’t
reach the rock. This left us in a quandary, H could have come up and I
belay him from a step but then it occurred to us that retreat with one
ice screw and a single rope meant 75’ of abseil. Added to this time
was getting on. Decided to go back left to snow. Descended on front
points - ice too hard for axe to grip but not very steep - 40-45° -
still it would have been a long fall, till back on snow cover. Traversed
one pitch left and brought H across, again belayed on ice step. Had
little chat. Time now 1.45 and estimated at least 1000’
[300m ]
to go.
Shortage of gear and tiredness. Decided it was foolish to continue, and
headed down - about 6 rope lengths to good lunch spot and bivi site.
Saw two figures in the distance. Had lunch. Took photos and headed down.
Both glad to be descending. Roped to top of snow slope then ran off down
to let the others know what had happened. They were moving slowly and we
were scared they might think we had succeeded and not bother coming up
to the foot of the ridge. Ran off to them and they agreed to give it a
bash the next day, biviing at the site we'd found. They were very tired
when they got to our camp. Felt really miserable getting to bed. Had
quick pog and took two sleepers and two shit pills (I had shat myself
again while drinking coffee H had made while I was coming up to the camp
with Rob & Bruce). Couldn’t be bothered with a brew. Slept like a
log, didn’t wake up till about 8. Saturday
17th August Felt
much better. Rob & Bruce got
off about 10.30 aiming for bivi at about 1/2 height - 20,500’
[6
250 m ]. Then to
summit next day. We wished them good luck - declined the offer of a
foursome. Just sat around all day, melting water and resting. Watching
R & B ascending. For some reason B seemed to prefer to ascend our
descent tracks rather than zigzag. They got to the ridge about 3. Then
stopped there a long time. Began to think they might turn back. But no,
they carried on & got to the bivi about 5. Miraculously the weather
cleared and it is now the clearest I’ve seen it. Very cold though. Had
to get up for a sh*t, despite trying to control it. Got really cold in
the wind and was in a miserable state when I got back in the tent. Woke
Harry up putting my hands down his pit to warm them up. Thought I would
have to go for another but held it down with an effort. Sunday
18th August Up
fairly early. Saw R & B had started climbing by about 7.30, a good
sign. Set off about 9.00 to do unclimbed ridge opposite. Fairly level to
S end of S peak. Then easy snow to crest - only 1000’ or so above camp
level. From ridge there was a marvelous view of the upper basin of the
Chatiboi glacier. Would make a marvelous place for a light expedition.
We really regretted not having gone there. The basin was surrounded by
19,000’ [5
800 m ]
separate peaks with a couple of big ones. All separate and
only one big and one small climbed. The basin was about 2000’ [600m ]
lower
than us - looked much more hospitable than the Pecchus plateau. The col
to it on our right was very steep though. Set
off along ridge. Soon scrambled up S summit gendarme. Watching R & B
make steady progress up Koyo Zom. They went left of the ice, just
skirting the rocks which we had nearly reached. We continued along the
ridge. It was a superb snowy ridge with red granite gendarmes to be
turned or climbed. Roped up after S summit. Impressive rock cliff
leading 2000’ or more to Chatiboi glacier on right and ~1000’ snow
slope on left. Excellent climbing. N summit was a corniced snow peak,
the ridge here being snow ice - good ice axe belays. Wearing crampons
all day and got to N summit by 2.00. S summit 6,020 m
[19
750 feet],
N summit 6,050
m
[19
850 feet].
Cold on top due to wind, so decided to set off down for lunch. We’d
been dawdling all day taking photos of each other, Pecchus Zom, Koyo Zom
and watching R & B. They had climbed above the rocks and were on the
snow arete preceding the summit rocks. We lost sight of them about now.
Often during the day we thought we could see them but were only looking
at rocks. H thought he could see steps on final snow but we weren’t
sure. For
a descent we had decided to just climb down the snowy W face of the N
summit, but as soon as we were on it we found it was ice most of the way
down. About 45°, but we had leant R & B two of our bang in ice
pegs, expecting them to leave a couple of theirs, but they apparently
took all six, so once more we only had one tubular ice screw. So we had
a 2 hour performance of one climbing down on front points to the end of
the rope, cutting a belay stance, then the other would take out the
screw, clip it on the rope and slide it down so the first could belay
his descent. All very trying in the hot sun - don’t know if one screw
would hold a 300’ fall anyway? Finally got to bergshrund and crossed
it fairly easily on a snow bridge. H dropped a crab due to mitted hands.
Got back to glacier just as sun left us. Could now see R & B
descending top snow slope - they must have been cold - but had they got
to the top? We couldn’t tell. Got back to bivi about 7.00. Very cold
and tired. Had to re-erect tent - some irritating puddles of water, but
luckily the pits were dry. Could
only be bothered with coffee and a few Garibaldi. Forgot to look for R
& B’s flare till 7.31, so didn’t see it, sent off green flare
anyway then went to sleep - took a mogadon - not a bad night. Monday
19th August Next
morning laid in and had a good breakfast, waiting for R & B. Soon
saw them making very erratic progress down mountain. Bruce got to us
while Rob was still making very slow progress down lower snow slope.
They had climbed Koyo Zom, but had had a bad fall near the top on the
summit rocks. Bruce had been coming second and slipped after only about
10’. Rob’s belay had pulled off and he had fallen about 100’. Then
luckily the rope (single 9 mm) had held over some rocks and saved them.
Both badly shaken but miraculously only cuts and bruises and strained
muscles. Rob was worse as his back hurt a lot. Bruce badly bruised. Rob
had lost a crampon after the fall and so now only had one. H had brew
ready for both of them as they told their tale. It didn’t really sink
in until later how serious it might have been. Cleared
up camp and set off down with all worthwhile food. Set off at 12. Rob
going badly. Found he had taken about 10 lbs of tinned food, so I took
them off him after a bit as the rest of us only had a little. Went back
their way, down the deep snow slope, which wasn’t too bad in descent
but would have been unpleasant going up. Got to Moac camp with Bruce at
about 3.00, to meet Nev & Colin. Told them all the story and H &
Rob arrived 1/4 hr. later. Sat around resting and pogging - had hardly
eaten or drunk (especially) the last few days. Nev still had the sh*ts.
They had got to the red bivi sight the night we had expected them at the
Moac, apparently they’d had heavy sacks! Colin wanted to do the
19,000’ rock peak behind the camp. He’d set off with Neville, but
violent sh*ts and weakness had sent them back to camp where they had
been waiting since. Quite glad they were there to help carry down the
loads - there was now a complete Vango there + 1 gallon of petrol and a
lot of food. Half felt like doing the climb with Colin, as no one else
would. But decided to think a bit before deciding in case I was tired. H
& I hacked out a sight for the bivi tent next to the Moac. A lot of
new crevasses had opened up round the sight - which always was noisy at
night with cracks and groans from the glacier. R & B went straight
to bed. The rest of us chatted and played a few hands of bridge in the
Moac before being driven to bed by the increasing ferocity of the farts.
During the night it fully sank in how bad things might have been. One
bad strain high on Koyo Zom would have been enough to give a serious
rescue problem - and only us two up there. I felt very bad and very
depressed about the whole thing. A bit of the usual nervous depression
set in, and I took some salvation in paracetamol. Decided I didn’t
feel a bit like the rock climb - it would have been more than a one day
affair and technically difficult - not worth the effort.
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